The Betsy Combier Story:
Now That Teacher Abuse Is Perfected,
Parents Are Open GameTimes have changed. It is no longer safe to be a PTA President, particularly if you question vanishing money. Read Betsy Combier's ordeal - her reward for being a good citizen and volunteering her time as PTA President.
The Middle School that three of my four daughters attended has a wonderful group of programs under one roof which truly offer diversity to the students and teachers who are part of the community, and the reason that I took my children out of the private school that they attended since kindergarten.. The programs are: Delta (gifted and Honors, mostly white, middle class students); NOVA (general ed., Full Inclusion, mostly Hispanic and African American); El Camino (Bi-Lingual, mostly Hispanic); Manhattan Valley (special education, mostly African American and Hispanic); VISTA (BI-Lingual, special education, mostly African American and Hispanic).
When I became PTA President I gave money, I wrote grants, I worked every day for this school, which my oldest daughter went to. Then my next two went there, and everything was fine until I had my PTA check given to the Superintendent by the Principal, and we never saw it again. Then I found out that there were 13 children who had graduated from a restricted special education school and placed as full-time full-inclusion students but never put onto the roster of the school.
The story of Timmy Allen, the son of Johnnie-Mae who was the VP for the NOVA Program on my PTA Executive Board, was printed in the local newspaper. My question for the past year has been, "How do Federal, State, and City funds follow children not placed onto the roster of the school they attend? And, if they are special Ed, wow, that's a nice piece of change.
So, I filed a grievance against the Principal and then, 2 days later, the Superintendent sent a rep to our PTA meeting who screamed that I had to resign. I refused. So, a group of parents got together and demanded that I set up a Special PTA meeting so I did, and they brought with them the Biggies from the Central Board, the School Board, the President's Council, everybody. The Principal stood up and told everyone that I was a liar and a person without any integrity. The parents invited to be there - many I had, in my 3 years of being PTA President, had never met before - screamed that I was a child abuser and must resign.
I don't know how I did it, but I refused, and remained calm. The Superintendent's rep. told everyone that a parent in the front row had something to say, and she stood up and read a grievance against me that had been filed 1 hour earlier with the School Board. I was charged with not getting minutes in on time, alienating everyone, doing nothing for the children, etc. Everything she said was a lie and my ears folded over it was so awful. I tried to talk, but was not allowed to. Then the rep told everyone that she had to set up a Review Committee to investigate me for incompetence. She picked 8 parents who screamed the loudest abuse, plus one parent who she thought hated me as well. She was wrong - this parent ended up resigning in August, and gave me all the emails which had been sent among the RC showing that all through the month of July and the beginning of August this group were writing a letter to all the parents in the school asking for information on my incompetence.
This is a violation of Education Law Article I Section 2-a. I wrote about 500 pages on this, and finally got the RC stopped, I thought. Then on October 16 the Superintendent started the RC up again, with an email address for comments which, I was told, I would never find out what was said about me. I started organizing the black and Hispanic parents in the school to attend the PTA meeting on November 15, so the Superintendent got a meeting arranged for Nov. 5 at which I was voted out of my position on charges that I could not fundraise. They forgot to mention that on October 1, 2001, the Chief Financial Officer of the BOE Office of Special Investigations had sent a letter to the Principal which was distributed to all the parents at the October 4 PTA meeting without me or my Executive Board knowing anything about it, telling all the parents that as I had raised too much money and I had told him that I had no idea what to do with all the money, the Principal had to stop me from fundraising. Then the Principal took all the PTA financial records - checks, budgets, files, etc., - and kept them locked in the PTA room, and would not give me or anyone "with" me in the PTA or on my Board, the key. Then the Review Committee "charged me" with being unable to fundraise. ( the Principal would not give me the key to the PTA financial records.
I have been threatened, and just this morning a woman called me and wanted to meet with me to talk, alone, about her school. It is very scary.
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Combier